It’s the not-knowing that is the most haunting.

I know I’ll never be able to take martial arts; I have made peace with that.

I know I will never be an amazing athlete; I have made peace with that as well.

Same with my body composition: I will never be rail-thin, I will never “fit” into most “fun” cars even when I finish my weight loss journey, I will never be the kind of guy who can fit into a Medium of anything clothing-wise. I have made peace with all of this.

But what of my dreams of homeownership? If this apartment is the best I will have, then knowing that at least lets me cherish it properly and redirect those savings toward a more immediate improvement in life.

What of my dreams to find a partner? If I’m going to spend my life single and unwed, then I’d at least like to know so I can make peace with that reality and focus my energy on friendships rather than dating.

Yet if I knew whether something was guaranteed, I would not take the risks to achieve it. I wouldn’t meet new people and learn more about my own flaws or strengths in pursuit of a relationship. I wouldn’t have evolved my tastes in food or drink, diversifying away from sugar-laden American foods in huge portions towards curries, and cocktails, and rice, and stir fry, and gyros, and even - dare I confess - salads.

Perhaps I need to make peace with the fact that some dreams are worth fighting for until the bitter end, never knowing if they’re achievable or not.

I read the article and fight with this from a different angle.

My son was diagnosed with cancer at 3, then during chemo it became abundantly clear that he had far more severe autism than we originally thought. Could have been made worse by the chemo and trauma; no real way to know.

Now my wife and I have had to give up all the dreams we had for when I retired from the military. A few good moves means that I actually retired at 40, though more modestly than I planned. But we will forever be taking care of him.

So we struggle with the unlived dreams often.

I have an understanding/interpretation of the philosopher Kierkegaard's metaphor of the Knight of Infinite Resignation from his work Fear and Trembling [1] that relates to this.

He tells the story of a Knight that falls in love with a princess. In the olden days princesses were married off by their parents for political reasons. There is no way his love, even if it is returned, can ever be fulfilled.

So the Knight resigns himself and marries the butchers widow. After all, she is pretty enough, she has inherited a profitable business from her late husband. And she will be elevated socially by a marriage to a Knight, so she is very keen.

But the Knight has to resign himself constantly, like in the dead of night while lying in bed and dreaming about what might have been. He must avoid falling into resentment and maintain the strength of his will.

This is a central concept to Kierkegaard, started in Either/Or and continued in Fear and Trembling.

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fear_and_Trembling

We have to distinguish "our" dreams from, let's say, cultural ones. A lot of what we want, what we perceive as living a full life, having fun and so on comes from culture (and increasingly in the last decades/centuries, with mass media).

Besides that, we can't achieve everything, we could not be everywhere when something interesting happens there, at the very least because a lot of those things happened in the past, or do everything because physical condition, economics, or extra conditions (i.e. being an astronaut).

So you draw lines. This is what I can do, I can go, I can be. You may push boundaries, but in the end it will always be more things outside than inside. And try to be the best on what matters on those boundaries.

These kind of articles remind me of an article in Polish I read few years ago: "Millennials are a generation that has fallen into the trap of constant self-development" It helped me to deal with my own unrealistic and unrealized dreams/aspirations/etc. Here's a version in English done by Google Translate https://archive.org/details/millennials-are-a-generation-tha... The original article in Polish: https://weekend.gazeta.pl/weekend/7,177344,30226401,milenial...

my son recently got into skateboarding which warmed my heart because i use to dream of being a pro-skater at his age. I dug out my old board and have gone to a few skateparks with him. Seeing a vert ramp was like seeing an old friend, i'm doing a lot of core and lower body workouts to see if I can get in a few more runs. There's one trick i've never been able to do and this is my last shot (I'm 50). After this summer, the cards will be on the table and, hopefully, I'll stop thinking about it hah.

There is irony in "wanting" something:

achieving it depends on different qualities than what starts to ramp up once you are strategically trying to get what you "want".

Suddenly your perception does not come from exploration, genuine interest or the human part. It starts to come from paying attention, sensitivity to setback, monitoring yourself in what you believe will make you achieve what you want, strategic behavior that isn't "natural" and attachment to a very specific outcome.

It was very hard to see this, sometimes you have to feel and be less analytic about stuff, then your perception will open doors as you walk through life, because deep down you were never attached to a specific outcome and therefore don't limit or sabotage yourself with what your beliefs about the world are at that time.

"Becoming a great snowboarder" is operating on a very different layer compared to "I really like snowboarding and then I somehow showed up over here and everyone here tells me I am a great snowboarder". Even being in this situation introduces perception that you may not be "a great snowboarder" at some point, which makes you become analytical about it.

> And yet, somehow, the more years go by, the more rarely I watch snowboarding videos.

I'd argue that snowboarding wasn't author's "dream" to begin with. I think it's reductive and unfair to compare your "oh it would be cool to do that" with someone else's actual dream: as in, a passion they pour their life and soul into. Being great at anything takes much more than a passing "it would be neat to be able to do X."

And achieving a dream (say, competing at the Olympics) is a lot less glamorous than a casual tourist might imagine.

I think I will always get more fulfillment from the rush of leaving work a bit early on a Friday afternoon, knowing I have a couple of plans for the weekend but not being too busy, picking up a treat for my wife and I on the way home, when the weather is good (cool and crisp or partly sunny and dry), and the city is alive; I will get more satisfaction from that feeling than any "dream" I could imagine.

The trick is to widen the scope of what you means.

If it means, us and we, then we are pulling 1080s. The dreams become what we can achieve. When anyone broke the 2hr marathon, we were happy for us. We did it, we landed on the moon. We ran a 4 minute mile or summited Everest w/o oxygen. Dreams are a dance and we have to figure out how to include ourselves and others dynamically.

One of the best lessons I've learned was that the happiest I've been (so far) was a time when I was dirt poor, while chasing my dream that everyone assured me ends in poverty.

Things have changed, but it takes some of the financial anxiety away when I remember that I would still give up everything to go back to that time.

A life well-lived is really what we should all hope for. What that actually means varies by person.

Sitting and thinking for 10 minutes about snowboarding when your knees are blown out is 10 minutes you could have used differently.

Everyone has regrets but my attitude is: I can’t change the past, but I can change the future.

Having kids really helps with making peace with unlived dreams. You simply are too tired to even think about those dreams. You are lucky if you can get one night of good sleep —- and trust me a good sleep when you have kids is different from a good sleep before that.

Dreams are a attack vector on the young, used by exploitive industries. Life-experiences hardens you against all things. Adds, Rockstars and Models..

I wanted to join the army as a kid, was infatuated by the forces. I had memorised spec-sheets, obsessed over the operations and used to be awestruck everytime I saw someone in olive green. Tried out a couple of times in college and was deemed medically unfit. I tried again last year but didn't make the cut either. Now I have crossed the age limit and will remain a code monkey for the rest of my life.

Nothing too bad. The life I live now is so much contrasting than the life I promised myself as a kid. I still have other hobbies and I still read a lot about the forces.

As someone that has done snowboarding and skying in Central Europe, the paradise of snowboarders and have been friend of profesionals, you probably don't want to be one of them.

It is one thing to go carving whenever you want, where you want because you have a good job outside it. Another totally different thing is spending all your time training. Most people will hate that.

Everybody wants to be a tennis player when they see one player raising the cup and earning millions. But a professional player spends most of her life doing extremely boring things. And only a very minority get enough money to live from the sport.

> Sometimes, dreams can just be dreams.

If (for any reason) we know that dreams cannot be achieved, there is a clear cut. And while it might take time to accept the situation, this realization is Stoic/Zen.

It is way harder if there is a chance, we try, yet fail. When do we keep trying, and how do we do so without losing hope piece by piece? It might be even harder when the dream is not something like "win a gold medal in snowboarding", "build a unicorn startup" or "publish a bestseller". But it is in the line of having kids, or being healthy, or other things that a lot of people take for granted.

I had the same mindset about wanting to be good at a lot of things, working on myself, not "wasting time", but now in my mid thirties I figured that if I really wanted to do something, I'd be actually doing it, and a lot of these goals boil down to "it would be cool if I was good at X", and aren't actually things I care about.

I would love to be a star ship captain in a universe with faster than light travel. Or a surgeon. But you know actual life is good and I do enjoy watching DS9 with my young adult son, Benjamin. And reading about all the other cool things. It is better to live an imperfect experience than just wish for an ideal imagined experience. And better to act wrongly than to be right but do nothing.

As I always say - do what you will regret NOT doing once you are old.

Actually I think poorly imagined dreams is a big problem.

People who have poorly imagined dreams are likely to screw up their working life and their retirement too.

There is more that you can pull off during your working years. As a matter of fact, you SHOULD. instead of sitting in front of the tv this weekend, go somewhere.

And in retirement, there is probably less you can pull off unless you focus and make it your job. You should do vigorous cardio, do strength training, connect with people more, not less. and make a good healthy retirement your job.

This article reminded me of this game called "Before your eyes" that is sort of tackling this same theme of unlived dreams. That game helped me realized that I will definitely not achieve all of my dreams but it also gave me the power to pursue them anyway.

I love that game. It's a 1-2h hour long game that I recommend everyone to play (and it's kinda a unique game that use your blinking as a game mechanic)

“I saw my life branching out before me like the green fig tree in the story. From the tip of every branch, like a fat purple fig, a wonderful future beckoned and winked. One fig was a husband and a happy home and children, and another fig was a famous poet and another fig was a brilliant professor, and another fig was Ee Gee, the amazing editor, and another fig was Europe and Africa and South America, and another fig was Constantin and Socrates and Attila and a pack of other lovers with queer names and offbeat professions, and another fig was an Olympic lady crew champion, and beyond and above these figs were many more figs I couldn't quite make out. I saw myself sitting in the crotch of this fig tree, starving to death, just because I couldn't make up my mind which of the figs I would choose. I wanted each and every one of them, but choosing one meant losing all the rest, and, as I sat there, unable to decide, the figs began to wrinkle and go black, and, one by one, they plopped to the ground at my feet.”

One of my favorite quotes by Sylvia Plath from the Bell Jar.

Appropos of nothing, snowboarding is so unbelievably fun once you’re past the immediate beginner phase of painfully flip-flopping down a slope, that it’s very reasonable to be a tad angry at not being able to live that dream.

I took running fairly seriously for six or seven years. I never really enjoyed it, but I ran religiously every week. I went from barely being able to run 1/6 of a mile without walking, to being able to finish a 5k. I ran a couple of local fun runs. I was never particularly good at it, but it was a real part of my life.

Two years ago, I slipped in a puddle on my bike and wrecked my ankle. There were many complications. Four surgeries later and I now have two pieces of titantium and a little slip of ultra-high molecular weight polyethelene (very strong plastic) where my ankle joint used to be.

I can never run again. Technically, at some point when I'm recovered enough from my last surgery, it should be possible. My surgeon said, "if you need to catch a flight or dodge traffic, sure". But I can't ever go out and run miles. It will just wear out the implant too quickly. The plastic can literally crack.

When I was recovering from surgery #3, my physical therapist told me to start walking regularly and keep track of distance. The first time I did, I opened Strava. All of my old runs popped up. I realized with a shock that I could scroll down and see not just the longest run I ever did, but the longest I ever will do.

I have dreams sometimes where I'm running, gliding across the ground effortlessly and painlessly. Usually, at some point I remember, "wait, you're not able to run anymore, you must be dreaming", and that tends to wake me up.

When I drive around the city, sometimes I pass places that used to be on my regular running routes. I remember what it felt like in my body to pound my way down that sidewalk, over that bridge. At first, these moments felt like a stab in my heart. Like a little part of my soul was being ripped out. Over time, that sharp stab faded to an ache, and then something more bittersweet. I lament that running is no longer part of my future, but I am at least grateful that I did run for a while. That chapter of my life is in the past, but at least I wrote the chapter.

For a long while, I was afraid I had lost much more than just running. But it seems like maybe the chronic pain is better and I will at least be able to walk and hike and dance without debilitating pain. But the running is over.

Losing a capability like this feels sort of like a fraction of death. Like a slice of my personhood has been amputated. It's made me realize that for most of us, the final chapters of our story aren't going full bore until the last page. Instead, aging means incrementally giving up more and more ability to do things, and accepting that more and more of our story is written and less and less is left to write.

It's still a struggle to accept that with any level of grace. I get where the author is coming from.

> You know what else I’d like to do besides becoming a great snowboarder? I want to learn kung fu. I’d also love to be a lot better at video games, get my Yu-Gi-Oh! hobby back on, and become at least fluent enough for everyday conversation in oh, I don’t know, eight more languages.

I think this sort of underplays the feeling of "lives unlived, paths not taken" that everyone gets hit with. Just flattens the whole thing that had been building up to that point, instead of allowing it to open up further.

Ime with sports and injuries. Doctors say alot of things, unless they are sports doctors that work with you to get back to sports or athletic them selves, they just give useless generic advice.

I lost a year becasue of doctors just telling me to rest for a constant pain I had.

Author should just go learn to snowboard. There's athletes out there competing with torn acls.

There is an analogy to be made between the space of human possibility and the space of possible Turing machines: in an unconstrained machine everything is possible and nothing is probable. If you accept constraints (e.g. the shape of a language) then most things become impossible but some things become probable. That is you gain access to some space and lose access to other space. It's a very fundamental trade-off and it's foolish to worry about it too much, especially considering that there is always some level of zoom where every hero, every winner of every game, is irrelevant.

Indeed the underlying insight that our lives are arbitrarily small and irrelevant, (yes, even the greatest titans of politics, tech, science and art), that drives the tech-elite long-now accelerationist ideal. Every life is characterized by [trade-offs + luck] and none of them have any meaning unless we get through the Great Filter. (Sure, this belief is mostly a post hoc rationalization to just do what you wanted in the first place, but I appreciate the attempt to paper over the naked self-interest.)

Making peace with the lived ones might be harder. Chasing the startup dream ended in bitterness, disappointment and debt. It forever damaged my marriage and my mental health. Be careful what you wish for.

Have you thought about absolutely monster knee braces? And then daily squats. They worked for me. Unfortunately now it’s my neck that’s trying to paralyze me, which would be such a not fun outcome.

Never let your memes be dreams nor your dreams be memes.

As someone with less than stellar knees who skis a lot, ski/ride powder. It's way easier on the body and more fun too. And maybe skip the big jumps. You can definitely still ride big/steep enough mountains for a big adrenaline rush.

I struggled quite a lot with this. I want to do everything, learn everything thus I ended up mastering nothing.

I've learned to play few instruments in last four years so I can jam with people but I still feel it's not enough.

As I got older I started to value relationships much more and overall became a happier person.

But still the knowledge that I never be a skilled doctor, physicist, exceptional chef, biologist, blacksmith, economist, successful entrepreneur and many more will still somehow hunt me.